AI model comparison

Ling 3.0 Flash VL vs DeepSeek V4.1 Flash

Pricing, context window, benchmarks, and features compared side by side. Or skip the guesswork and send one prompt to both.

Ling 3.0 Flash VL builds on Ling 3.0 Flash (124B total / 5.5B active MoE from InclusionAI), further strengthening its language capabilities while adding native visual perception and advanced visual

Input / 1M: $0.06
Output / 1M: $0.18
Context: 131K

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is a sparse mixture-of-experts model from DeepSeek, and the first built on the company's Causal Encoder-Decoder (CED) architecture.

Input / 1M: $0.15
Output / 1M: $0.60
Context: 1.05M

Comparing image generators? Compare image models

At a glance

Quick verdict

How the two models stack up on the things people ask about most.

Lower price

Ling 3.0 Flash VL

2.9x cheaper for a typical chat

Higher intelligence score

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash

24.7 vs 24.6 on Artificial Analysis

Larger context window

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash

1.05M vs 131K tokens

Newer release

Ling 3.0 Flash VL

Released September 10, 2026

Benchmarks

Benchmark scores

Independent scores from Artificial Analysis. Higher is better.

Intelligence index

Ling 3.0 Flash VL24.6

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash24.7

Coding index

Ling 3.0 Flash VL57

DeepSeek V4.1 FlashNot available

Agentic index

Ling 3.0 Flash VL28.7

DeepSeek V4.1 FlashNot available

Pricing

Ling 3.0 Flash VL vs DeepSeek V4.1 Flash API pricing

Per-token API rates. Cheaper option highlighted.

Metric	Ling 3.0 Flash VL	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash
Input tokensPer 1M tokens	$0.06	$0.15
Output tokensPer 1M tokens	$0.18	$0.60
Cached input (read)Per 1M tokens	$0.01	$0.00
Cache writePer 1M tokens	Not available	Not available

What it costs in practice

Estimated cost per 1,000 requests at standard rates. Coding and long-document figures also show the cost when the input is already cached.

Chat message

2K in, 500 out

Ling 3.0 Flash VL$0.21

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash$0.60

Coding task

30K in, 4K out

Ling 3.0 Flash VL$2.52$1.08 cached

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash$6.90$2.49 cached

Long document summary

150K in, 2K out

Ling 3.0 Flash VL$9.36$2.16 cached

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash$23.70$1.65 cached

Specs

Context window and capabilities

How much each model can read, how much it can write, and what it accepts as input.

Metric	Ling 3.0 Flash VL	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash
Context window	131K tokens	1.05M tokens
Max output	33K tokens	393K tokens
Input types	Image, Text, Video	Image, Text
Output types	Text	Text
Reasoning effort levels	Not available	Max, High, Low, None
Default reasoning effort	Not available	High
Release date	September 10, 2026	September 10, 2026

Features

Supported features

API features available for each model.

Metric	Ling 3.0 Flash VL	DeepSeek V4.1 Flash
Tool calling	Supported	Supported
Structured outputs	Supported	Supported
JSON mode	Supported	Supported
Reasoning	Supported	Supported
Temperature	Supported	Supported
Stop sequences	Supported	Supported
Deterministic seed	Supported	Supported
Verbosity control	Not supported	Not supported

Our take

Ling 3.0 Flash VL is 2.9x cheaper for a typical chat. DeepSeek V4.1 Flash scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (24.7 vs 24.6). DeepSeek V4.1 Flash has the larger context window (1.05M vs 131K tokens). The right pick depends on your workload, so the quickest way to settle it is to send the same prompt to both and compare.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Is Ling 3.0 Flash VL or DeepSeek V4.1 Flash cheaper?

Ling 3.0 Flash VL is cheaper for a typical chat (2K input tokens and 500 output tokens). Ling 3.0 Flash VL costs $0.06 per 1M input tokens and $0.18 per 1M output tokens, while DeepSeek V4.1 Flash costs $0.15 per 1M input tokens and $0.60 per 1M output tokens.

Which has a bigger context window, Ling 3.0 Flash VL or DeepSeek V4.1 Flash?

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash supports up to 1.05M tokens of context, compared with 131K for Ling 3.0 Flash VL.

Is Ling 3.0 Flash VL smarter than DeepSeek V4.1 Flash?

On the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, Ling 3.0 Flash VL scores 24.6 and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash scores 24.7, putting DeepSeek V4.1 Flash ahead. Benchmarks don't capture everything, so the best test is running your own prompts through both.

Can I use Ling 3.0 Flash VL and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash at the same time?

Yes. Shortcut Chat sends one prompt to multiple models at once, so you can see Ling 3.0 Flash VL and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash answer side by side and keep the better response.

Why choose? Ask both.

Send one prompt to Ling 3.0 Flash VL and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash at the same time. Compare the answers side by side and keep the best one.

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